Earth Sciences in Mongolia

Earth Sciences doctoral students John Graf and Thomas Adams, who provided the reports for this blog, along with Professor Louis L. Jacobs, are traveling to Mongolia as a part of a multi-international dinosaur expedition hosted by the city of Hwaseong in the Republic of Korea. The purpose of the project is to discover, collect and study dinosaur fossils from the Gobi desert in Mongolia, which is one of the most important dinosaur localities in the world.
In addition to SMU researchers, the multinational team includes researchers from Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM) and Paleontological Center, Mongolian Academy of Sciences and the University of Alberta, Canada. The project will be augmented each year by additional researchers from countries including the United States, Canada, Japan and China.

Louis and I have already started our travels with a delay. After we boarded our flight in Los Angeles, the plane had technical problems that required us to wait four hours for a replacement part. This would cause us to miss our connecting flight in Beijing, China.

The next available flight from Beijing to Ulaan Baatar, Mongolia, would be the next morning, requiring us to spend a day in Beijing. After 17 hours on the plane, we welcomed the opportunity to freshen up, relax and enjoy the local cuisine.